The impact of North Sea oil and gas on the British economy is examined thoroughly in this book. It explores why the early years of the 1980s, when oil production had risen to the level of self-sufficiency and beyond were years of recession and unemployment. The book compares the record of British government policy with that of Norway, the Netherlands, Venezuela, Australia and Japan. Issues such as long – term energy policy are also examined.

The downhill slide in the global price of crude oil, which started mid-2014, had major repercussions across the Middle East for net oil exporters, as well as importers closely connected to the oil-producing countries from the Gulf. Following the Arab uprisings of 2010 and 2011, the oil price decline represented a second major shock for the region in the early twenty-first century – one that has continued to impose constraints, but also provided opportunities. Offering the first comprehensive analysis of the Middle Eastern political economy in response to the 2014 oil price decline, this book connects oil market dynamics with an understanding of socio-political changes. Inspired by rentierism, the contributors present original studies on Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. The studies reveal a large diversity of country-specific policy adjustment strategies: from the migrant workers in the Arab Gulf, who lost out in the post-2014 period but were incapable of repelling burdensome adjustment policies, to Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon, who have never been able to fulfil the expectation that they could benefit from the 2014 oil price decline. With timely contributions on the COVID-19-induced oil price crash in 2020, this collection signifies that rentierism still prevails with regard to both empirical dynamics in the Middle East and academic discussions on its political economy.

This book explains the place of oil in the economic and political predicaments that now confront the West. Thompson explains the problems that the rising cost of oil posed in the years leading up to the 2008 crash, and the difficulties that a volatile oil market now poses to economic recovery under the conditions of high debt, low growth and quantitative easing. The author argues that the 'Gordian knot' created by the economic and political dynamics of supply and demand oil in the present international economy poses a fundamental challenge to the assumption of economic progress embedded in Western democratic expectations.

Explaining—and solving—the oil curse in the developing world Countries that are rich in petroleum have less democracy, less economic stability, and more frequent civil wars than countries without oil. What explains this oil curse? And can it be fixed? In this groundbreaking analysis, Michael L. Ross looks at how developing nations are shaped by their mineral wealth—and how they can turn oil from a curse into a blessing. Ross traces the oil curse to the upheaval of the 1970s, when oil prices soared and governments across the developing world seized control of their countries' oil industries. Before nationalization, the oil-rich countries looked much like the rest of the world; today, they are 50 percent more likely to be ruled by autocrats—and twice as likely to descend into civil war—than countries without oil. The Oil Curse shows why oil wealth typically creates less economic growth than it should; why it produces jobs for men but not women; and why it creates more problems in poor states than in rich ones. It also warns that the global thirst for petroleum is causing companies to drill in increasingly poor nations, which could further spread the oil curse. This landmark book explains why good geology often leads to bad governance, and how this can be changed.

This book addresses energy research from four distinct International Political Economy perspectives: energy security, governance, legal and developmental areas. Energy is too important to be neglected by political scientists. Yet, within the mainstream of the discipline energy research still remains a peripheral area of academic enquiry seeking to plug into the discipline’s theoretical debates. The purpose of this book is to assess how existing perspectives fit with our understanding of social science energy research by focusing on the oil and gas dimension.

In an urgent follow-up to his best-selling Why Your World Is About To Get A Whole Lot Smaller, Jeff Rubin argues that the end of cheap oil means the end of growth. What it will be like to live in a world where growth is over? Economist and resource analyst Jeff Rubin is certain that the world's governments are getting it wrong. Instead of moving us toward economic recovery, the measures being taken around the globe right now are digging us into a deeper hole. Both politicians and economists are missing the fact that the real engine of economic growth has always been cheap, abundant fuel and resources. But that era is over. The end of cheap oil, Rubin argues, signals the end of growth--and the end of easy answers to renewing prosperity. With China and India sucking up the lion's share of the world's ever more limited resources, the rest of us will have to make do with less. But is this all bad? Rubin points out that there is no research to show that people living in countries with hard-charging economies are happier, and plenty of research to show that some of the most contented people on the planet live in places with no growth or slow growth. But bad or good, it's the new reality, and Rubin reveals how our day-to-day lives will be drastically changed.

UK ties with Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf monarchies are under the spotlight as never before. Huge controversy surrounds Britain’s alliances with these deeply repressive regimes, and the UK’s key supporting role in the disastrous Saudi-led intervention in Yemen has lent added urgency to the debate. What lies behind the British government’s decision to place politics before principles in the Gulf? Why have Anglo-Arabian relations grown even closer in recent years, despite ongoing, egregious human rights violations? In this ground-breaking analysis, David Wearing argues that the Gulf Arab monarchies constitute the UK’s most important and lucrative alliances in the global south. They are central both to the British government’s ambitions to retain its status in the world system, and to its post-Brexit economic strategy. Exploring the complex and intertwined structures of UK-Gulf relations in trade and investment, arms sales and military cooperation, and energy, Wearing shines a light on the shocking lengths to which the British state has gone in order to support these regimes. As these issues continue to make the headlines, this book lifts the lid on ‘AngloArabia’ and what’s at stake for both sides.

United States monetary policy has traditionally been modeled under the assumption that the domestic economy is immune to international factors and exogenous shocks. Such an assumption is increasingly unrealistic in the age of integrated capital markets, tightened links between national economies, and reduced trading costs. International Dimensions of Monetary Policy brings together fresh research to address the repercussions of the continuing evolution toward globalization for the conduct of monetary policy. In this comprehensive book, the authors examine the real and potential effects of increased openness and exposure to international economic dynamics from a variety of perspectives. Their findings reveal that central banks continue to influence decisively domestic economic outcomes—even inflation—suggesting that international factors may have a limited role in national performance. International Dimensions of Monetary Policy will lead the way in analyzing monetary policy measures in complex economies.

Retrospective: 9.